Developing a Cure (But You've Been Here All Along)
by dydrmrnghtthnkr
Summary: Keith thinks he's discovered the cure to Hanahaki. Keith is also very, very wrong.


In retrospect, Keith should've realized something was off when he _didn't feel like training_.

Everyone had a thing on Team Voltron. For example, Hunk was the culinary master. Shiro was the leader, Allura was the other scarier leader, etc, etc. Keith's thing? Keith's thing was training.

Keith would _normally_ get up, consume some food goo, then head straight for his bayard and have a nice, relaxing, early-morning decapitation session with some simulations.

But on this particular morning, Keith did not feel like training.

Instead, he wanted to _wait_ and eat. _With the rest of the team_.

So he waited and glared at the surprised looks he received. Luckily, everyone had the good grace to keep their mouths shut, (although Shiro did insist on checking his temperature and Pidge _did_ have to slap hands over both Hunk's and Lance's mouths) and breakfast proceeded without (many) murderous inclinations.

It was...nice.

Until it got worse.

Infinitely incredibly _impossibly_ worse.

Because Keith was actually _enjoying_ breakfast with the team.

He liked when Pidge wandered in, half-asleep still and leaning on Hunk, who simply smiled indulgently at her and offered a bowl of food goo. He liked how Coran waltzed in with a cheery good morning and how Allura did her best to hide her yawns. He liked how Shiro made sure to draw everyone into whatever conversation was taking place. Keith liked how Lance rubbed at his eyes and how he had funny stories to tell and how every few sentences were punctuated with a yawn. He liked-

And that was the problem.

Keith _liked._

There was no problem with liking _most_ of the team, because that liking felt warm and homey and like family.

Lance was the exception (and maybe he shouldn't have been so surprised by that.)

Their rivalry had changed over the months, shifting from angry and vicious to something warm, something that meant Keith could declare his complete and utter detestation for Lance and Lance would know he didn't mean it.

Keith still felt warm and homey around him but also nervous and excited and soft and fuzzy and kind of like there were tiny little things jumping around in his stomach, as if his stomach was a trampoline.

(He wanted those stupid things to stop jumping, but then they just started jumping _more_ and _fluttering_ as well.)

Keith started eating more meals with the team, as if prolonged exposure to Lance would somehow make the incessant need to kiss him cease.

More meals was the _opposite_ of helpful.

Because now Keith had even more reasons for why Lance was a kissable person. And - even worse - Keith started _looking forward_ to meals.

He would try to train, but he could never finish as many levels of the training simulation as he could before this whole liking thing started.

Because the mighty, brave, very capable and intelligent Red Paladin would be _distracted_.

Keith would go in determined to focus on beating up imaginary enemies and then his thoughts would stray to stupid Lance and his stupid face and his stupid jacket and his stupid legs and his stupid smile-

And then he would think of _when_ he could see Lance and he'd check to see how much time he'd spent fighting and _then_ he'd calculate how much more time he had to kill before it was time to have whatever meal came next.

And then the Gladiator would send him flying and Keith would be the proud owner of another bruise.

Maybe, he thought a little bit desperately, he could just _stop_ going to team meals.

Except then Lance slept through breakfast.

Keith bitterly stabbed at his food goo (ignoring Hunk's whispered "He does know that you're supposed to _eat_ food goo, right?"), frowning and being childish and _knowing_ he was being childish. The concerned looks the rest of the team (minus Lance because Lance _wasn't there_ ) went ignored.

Finally, Keith growled something along the lines of "I'm done, I'm fine, I'm going to train" and left, his poor, uneaten bowl of food goo abandoned to his teammates.

He stomped away, huffing and scowling and being generally miserable when he turned the corner in the hallway and saw _him_.

Keith definitely did not attempt to run away. He just simply weighed the pros and cons of a strategic retreat and decided that strategically retreating was most certainly a wonderful idea.

Because Lance was still wearing his pajamas and he was yawning and his hair was sticking up at the back and he had fuzzy Blue Lion slippers on and Keith knew if he didn't disappear soon he might accidentally say something stupid, like "Hi you look really cute please kiss me," or "At this very moment, if you punched me in the face I would probably thank you."

Really, it was all for the greater good.

Then, _of course_ , Lance just had to look up. And he was smiling, a sleepy soft kind of smile and Keith felt his insides melt into a gooey mess of affection, his previous irritation evaporating.

"Morning," Lance yawned.

"A bit later than that, I would say," Keith said, mentally screeching. He felt a bead of sweat run down his neck, and was almost certain his face was bright red.

"Pfft, it's probably not even time for lunch." Lance paused. "It's not time for lunch, right?"

"Everyone should still be eating breakfast."

Lance suddenly looked very concerned. "Shouldn't _you_ also still be eating breakfast? You know, being part of the team and all?"

Keith fumbled for an explanation that didn't involve "You weren't there and I was upset so I stabbed my food instead of eating it and stomped out of there like a three year-old." He must have taken too long though, because Lance gasped. "Keith! Did you not eat breakfast? Breakfast is good for you, I know food goo gets kind of boring after the gazillionth time, but that doesn't mean you can just _stop_ eating breakfast, come on, we have to go get some food into you, besides I'm hungry aren't you hungry?"

Lance babbled on and on, and before Keith could get a word in, he'd been dragged to the kitchen.

Coran grinned when he saw the Blue Paladin. "Lance, my boy! Good to see you're finally up!" Then he noticed that Keith was (not, _definitely not_ , Red Paladins do _not_ hide) hiding behind Lance. "And with Keith...?" His smile shifted into something a little bit more knowing. Keith winced. Maybe he'd been a bit too obvious with his affections.

Lance narrowed his eyes. "Yes, with _Keith_. Apparently," he said, glaring viciously at the Red Paladin (an effect which was rather marred by the fact that he was wearing fuzzy Blue Lion slippers), " _someone_ didn't eat breakfast today."

"I _did_ eat," he protested. "Sort of."

"He did show up to breakfast," Shiro said. Hunk nodded in agreement. Keith was glad some people were on his side. His gratitude promptly disappeared when Hunk then added, "but he didn't eat much."

Lance's glare intensified.

Pidge snickered. "Yeah, I think our Red Paladin was a _little_ worked up this morning. Something _awful_ must've happened for him to start stabbing his food goo."

Keith drew a line across his neck with his index finger. Pidge smirked.

Lance gasped. "Keith! You haven't stabbed your food goo in- huh, how long was it? Four, five- _at least_ five days! What happened? I mean, I know last time was because your gloves got dirty and you were forced to expose your tan lines to us since they needed to be washed."

He nodded to himself thoughtfully. "And the time before _that_ was because Shiro _totally_ kicked your butt during training…"

Allura looked meaningfully at Lance. "It's almost as if something or _someone_ ," she paused, "caused this round of food goo extermination. That is, after all, what happened in previous bouts of food goo stabbing."

Keith didn't like that pause. Just how many people knew about his crush on Lance?

Lance snapped his fingers. "You're completely right! But what caused this round? Hmm..."

He turned to the resident Space Dad. "Sparring?"

"Nope," Shiro said.

Lance turned to Keith, stepping back as he did so in order to properly observe the Red Paladin, presumably checking to ensure Keith wasn't missing any pieces of clothing.

Keith felt himself heat up as Lance stared intently at him.

"Wow," Allura whispered. "Even his ears are red." She turned to Pidge and smirked. "I suppose that's why they call him the-"

"Oh _no_ -"

" _Princess_ , please."

Allura's smirk widened. "- _Red Paladin_!"

Hunk groaned as Pidge and Coran high-fived the Princess. Keith saw Shiro sigh as he shook his head in dismay.

Lance remained (fortunately for him) oblivious as he continued to observe Keith, muttering under his breath all the while. "Gloves, check. Mullet, check. Jacket, check."

"I have all my clothes!"

"Well, _we_ thought that, too, until you started getting all stabby! Who knows what other tan lines you have? Pants, check…"

Finally, Pidge interjected. "Lance, he's not missing any clothing. I know how terrible it must be for you to be deprived of an opportunity to check Keith out-"

"Am not! I was just-" Lance sputtered, determinedly not looking at Keith anymore.

" _But_ ," she continued, ignoring him, "maybe you should think about this a different way."

Lance arched an eyebrow. "Oh really. And what way might that be?"

Pidge smiled sweetly. "Who is usually here at breakfast?" Keith paled.

"Uh, the team."

"And who was here at breakfast this morning?"

"You, Hunk, Coran, pretty much everyone but me, actually."

It was as if a lightbulb had appeared above Lance's head. " _Oh_ , I get it now." He smiled triumphantly. Keith cursed Pidge to a lifetime of no technology and closed his eyes as he mentally prepared himself to book it out of the kitchen after Lance disclosed his revelation. No need for everyone see his reaction to Lance not reciprocating his feelings. They might want to _talk about it_. Absolutely terrible.

But apparently, Lance was (among other things) very very stupid.

The Blue Paladin's revelation caused Keith to snap his eyes open, rooted in place.

"I- _what_?"

Everyone else seemed to be in similar states of disbelief.

"Lance, Keith was _definitely not_ upset because he was planning a _team-building activity during breakfast_."

"Yeah man, where did you even get that idea?"

Coran stroked his mustache thoughtfully. "Could he not just have that activity moved to lunch or dinner instead?"

Lance huffed. "Well, _maybe_ you can only do the activity at breakfast. Maybe he wanted us to all tell each other about the dreams we had last night, and maybe if we did it at lunch or dinner, we'd forget. Eh? Ever think about that?"

He stuck his tongue out triumphantly. "Yeah, didn't think so."

Pidge groaned. "Hopeless," she proclaimed.

"Unbelievable," Hunk said, shaking his head.

Coran and Allura shared twin looks of frustration and there was a thud as Shiro's head hit the table.

Keith didn't know if he should be very very relieved or very very concerned about Lance's observation skills. He settled for reluctantly grateful and huffed away, determined to forget about everything and anything that had occurred today.

When he made it to the training room, Keith couldn't help but notice that even in the reflection of one of the practice blades, his face was bright red.

The first time Keith coughed up petals he didn't recognize it for what it was.

He merely thought it was part of the interesting new plant (possibly animal?) Coran had insisted on fixing up for the Paladins. In Keith's defense, the plant-maybe-animal substance was blue and had flakes coming off of it, and one of those flakes could easily have been misconstrued as a petal.

 _And_ Hunk kept complaining that the weird blue flakey-bits kept sticking to his tongue, _and_ Pidge seconded his statement.

So it made perfect sense for Keith to determine that the petals were flakey-bits.

The second time Keith coughed up petals, however, it was very clear that those petals were, in fact, petals, and not any petal-esque substances.

It happened during training. It had originally been a group training session, but Pidge and Hunk drifted away to examine a piece of machinery Allura and Coran proclaimed needed fixing, and then Shiro decided that the Black Lion absolutely _had_ to be cleaned, and then it was just Keith and Lance.

Lance and Keith.

Keith had just pinned Lance to the floor and was desperately trying to ignore how the situation could be misinterpreted. He'd almost gotten Lance to admit defeat when his traitorous body decided to be awful and force him to cough.

Still coughing, Keith crawled off of Lance, one hand over his mouth and the other extended so that he could help Lance up.

(Not because he wanted to hold hands with Lance or anything, that would be dumb.)

Instead of being grateful, Lance looked at Keith with wide (ocean blue) eyes as he stared dumbly at Keith's hand. No, not Keith's hand. Just Keith.

Lance was looking up and down Keith's body in unmasked horror.

Keith felt offended. He huffed. "Okay Lance, what could possibly be wrong with me now? Do I really look _that_ terrible? I'm dressed today like I am every other day. There is literally no difference between me normally and me today. I mean, I thought you would've gotten over your mullet hatred by now, _honestl_ -"

"No! Keith, the mullet is fine, your clothes are fine. You look fine! What's not fine is the fact that you have petals all over you!"

Keith gaped at Lance for a moment (his brain had short-circuited after the words "the mullet is fine") then looked down at his clothes.

 _Oh._

So, maybe Keith's clothes had gotten a bit more floral. He really didn't get the big deal about it. Okay fine, so the flower petals hadn't been there before, but hey! Pidge and Hunk were always inventing strange new devices, and one of them could totally have the sole purpose of generating flower petals.

Why then, did Lance look so upset?

The Blue Paladin was still staring at the petals, as if maybe staring hard enough at them would make them go away.

"Uh, Earth to Lance," Keith said, waving a hand in front of the other boy's face. "Feel free to stop staring at me at any moment now."

Lance blinked. Once, twice. Then he launched himself at Keith, knocked them both to the ground, and promptly burst into tears.

Keith's heart hurt.

"Keith! I'm so sorry, I had no idea… Listen, you're going to get through this, okay? Whatever you need, anything at all, just ask and I will get it! I will get it for you, okay? I don't care if you want the moon, I'll get it for you! Just stay strong!" Lance wiped his face with his sleeve, then wrapped his arms around Keith tighter, burying his head in the crook of his neck. "It's gonna be okay. It'll all be fine."

Keith was confused. And concerned. There were approximately zero reasons for Lance to be sobbing dramatically into Keith's chest over flowers, yet it was happening.

He wondered for second if he had been transported into a different reality.

Then he realized that this was technically a hug, that Lance was still very obviously upset, and that he should probably be doing something. Keith tentatively wrapped his arms around Lance and pat him gently on the back.

"There, there," he tried. "It's going to be okay."

Lance gripped onto Keith tighter. It was comforting to feel the warmth of Lance in his arms, and maybe that was why Lance was holding on like he wouldn't ever get another chance to hold Keith again. He still didn't know what was wrong, just that Lance was crying and that there was an uncomfortable tightness in his chest.

"Hey, Lance," Keith finally said. "What's wrong?"

"I- what do you mean what's wrong? You have Hanahaki!"

And then Lance was crying even more furiously.

Hanahaki. Keith had heard the term before, but he didn't remember much about it. He didn't know anything about it, actually, except that it wasn't very common. He was worried asking about it might make Lance even more upset though, so Keith promised himself he'd look it up later and focused on making Lance feel more at ease.

Keith wasn't sure how long they spent in the training room, just that as time passed, Lance's breathing got more and more steady, until he wasn't crying at all anymore, until they were breathing together.

He carefully untangled himself from the pile of limbs they'd become.

"You feeling alright?"

Lance gave a weak smile. "Yeah. Sorry, for uh, crying all over you."

Keith hoped he was giving a reassuring smile in return. "No, it's fine. I'm here if you ever need to…"

Lance managed a weak chuckle. "Cry?"

Keith nodded sheepishly.

The smile Lance gave next was little wider, a little brighter. "I feel like I should be telling you that. But thank you. I'll uh, remember that. And don't worry, I won't tell anyone if you don't want me to."

"Yeah that would be nice. Thanks." And then Keith almost messed it all up. He coughed.

Lance's smile tightened. He ran the back of his hand over his eyes, and choked out a "well, we should probably be getting to dinner then" as he made his way out of the training room.

Keith felt his brow furrow. He looked back at the myriad of blue scattered over the floor.

He didn't know why, but he felt the need to pick the petals up, to hide them.

Keith bundled up the flowers in his jacket pocket and left for dinner.

The whole team was there. Shiro, and everyone else actually, shot concerned looks over to Lance and Keith.

"You guys alright?" Shiro asked tentatively. Keith winced. There were still some tear stains on his shirt and Lance's eyes were red.

Lance laughed. "Of course!" He elbowed Keith. "Right?"

"R-right." Keith said, smiling as convincingly as he could.

Hunk and Pidge exchanged skeptical looks. But Lance was an expert at deflecting attention, almost as much of an expert he was at commanding it, and their teammates' concerns slowly deflated over the course of the evening.

Allura still anxiously bit her lip whenever she looked at Lance and Keith, and Coran's gaze was still unusually sharp, but Keith felt confident that they were mostly reassured.

And he was right. By the end of dinner, there were no shadows in Pidge's eyes, no tension in Allura's back.

When the Red Paladin finally makes his way back to his room, he digs out the computers Pidge and Hunk built so everyone could have one of their own.

It took a good thirty minutes, but Keith finally figures out how to search for information.

"H-a-n-a-h-a-k-i."

Page after page after page of results came up. Keith selects the first result, an explanation of what Hanahaki was.

"Hanahaki is a disease in which flowers grow in the lungs, constricting the pathways and making it difficult to breathe. It occurs in cases of unrequited love, and can only be naturally cured when the love becomes requited. Medication can be taken to slow the rate of growth of the flowers, which varies from person to person. Oftentimes, the afflicted will find themselves coughing up petals, and in drastic cases, multiple flowers at once. In order to completely remove the flowers in cases of unrequited love, surgical operations may be performed. Removing the flowers surgically will also remove the feelings and memories the affiliated had of their unrequited love. It should be noted that the surgical operations will remove the flowers and that medication will not, but that medication will not affect the memories and feelings towards the afflicted's object of affection in any way, unlike the surgical operations. If the love remains unrequited and nothing is done to stop the progression of the disease, the afflicted will die."

Keith stops there.

His head is spinning and it's suddenly so hard to breathe (what if the flowers are growing _right now_ ) and he knew that he could die, going into this, because he pilots a giant robot lion and that's bound to raise some danger but this is _different_ , so different-

Keith breathes in.

He exhales.

Keith goes to sleep.

When he wakes up, there are petals on his pillow. They're blue, and for some reason this makes him smile, because blue reminds him of Lance, and even though loving Lance will likely literally be the death of him, Keith doesn't mind. He can think of worse ways to die.

When Keith gets to breakfast, the only one at the table is Shiro.

"Good morning." Shiro says. "How'd you sleep? Everyone else already ate."

The unspoken "it's not like you to oversleep" hangs in the air.

Keith takes a massive bite of food goo. It's boring and routine and Keith thinks he could get really used to that.

"I slept fine. Stayed up a bit too late I guess." He smiles.

Shiro arches an eyebrow. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," Keith says. He shovels in the rest of his goo as quick as he can, then takes his leave. "Off to train, now."

"Have fun!" Shiro calls, as Keith walks out.

"Yeah. Fun." Keith mutters.

He goes back to his room and sleeps.

When he wakes, he stares at the ceiling. Then he grabs a pillow, a blanket, and his jacket. Keith opens his door and stares at Lance's room, directly opposite of his.

He breathes in.

He exhales.

Keith knocks.

A bleary-eyed Lance opens the door. Looks as if he wasn't the only one oversleeping. Keith smirks at the thought.

"Hey, can I crash here?"

Lance's eyebrows almost jump off his face at the request. Then he gives a confused smile, and says through a yawn, "Sure, why not?"

As Keith follows him in, Lance says over his shoulder, "I thought you'd be training."

"Yeah, well. There are more important things in life, you know."

Lance is silent as he sits on his bed. He studies his hands.

"Like friends. And team meals. And laughing and being happy and smiling." Keith doesn't know where this sappy stuff is coming from, or why his mouth can't seem to stop moving, but it hardly matters now, does it?

Lance pulls him into a hug.

"Hey now," he says, voice crackly. "You weren't thinking like this yesterday."

Keith chuckles. "I didn't know I had Hanahaki yesterday." His eyes are wet.

(It feels strange, to admit it outloud. It makes it sound real, like this isn't all just a terrible terrible dream Keith's been living in.)

Lance pulls back, eyes wide. "Wait, wait. What? You didn't? You dork!" And then he's cackling.

"How could you not know?" Lance continues, wiping his eyes. "What the hell, Keith?"

"I don't know," Keith says, laughing now, too. He doesn't know why, because it's not funny and Lance knows that, too, but they're laughing like it's the funniest thing in the world.

Keith coughs as he laughs and there's an explosion of blue. There are so so so many petals and Keith knows what this means, knows how absolutely gone he is, and he laughs and laughs and laughs because if he doesn't then he might cry and cry and cry.

It hurts. His chest feels tight.

There are so many petals.

He leans into Lance's chest and their laughter dissipates into empty, wracking sobs.

They breathe together.

Keith breathes in.

He exhales.

(Keith closes his eyes and sees blue.)


End file.
